Can you BS transaction sizes on your resume?
Assuming that the deals haven't closed, can you fudge the numbers on your transaction experience? i.e. $17mm --> $20mm
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No, that's lying. On what planet would this be acceptable?
But, you're missing the bigger picture here. It is not the size of the transaction, but rather your experience, what you learned and worked on on the transaction, and how well you can speak about all of this that matters. If all you did was do some basic buyer research or edited some charts in the CIM, it won't matter if it was a $20MM or a $200MM transaction.
You're right. Just wasn't sure if this is a thing that most people do.
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Agreed. Let's say you get some questions about multiples, leverage, purchase price, EBITDA (pre- or post-synergies), you want these exact numbers. Saying "Um it was around 4.25x leveraged" is a very shitty answer compared to "Well, off unadjusted EBITDA leverage was 5.00x, but once we adjusted for $XM of cost synergies the purchaser could realize on Day 1, we marketed the transaction at 4.30x".
high eight figures
So there's some nuance to acceptable 'rounding' : If you're trying to obfuscate which specific deal you worked on by rounding some figures etc to maintain confidentiality - good on you.
If you're trying to inflate sizes on closed transactions for some sense of prestige - it reflects poorly on both your honesty and your self-awareness.
Not gonna pretend I wasn't thinking about prestige when I asked this question. But now I realize that it's far more important to be able to answer follow-up questions with specificity than to pretend it was a blockbuster deal. Appreciate the guidance
Let's make this even easier; if your only deal experience is a $17M deal, you should not focus on the deal's size.
On a less relevant note, people do go back and forth between announced deal value and deal value at close if one is higher than the other (fixed exchange ratios). It really doesn't matter though.
"Let's make this even easier; if your only deal experience is a $17M deal, you should not focus on the deal's size."
Could you clarify? Do you mean in my head/on my resume/in an interview?
The difference between a $17M deal and a $20M deal is immaterial. You should include the deal value in your resume if it is publicly available but if you value the magnitude of the number (as your attempt to "fudge" the number indicates), you should realize that it is not a large deal and nearly shops you interview at will recognize that.
Just focus on the ways you helped execute and the skills you learned from it.
Round to the closest hundred $mm
If deal is under $100mm, round out to the closest $mm
In my mind it's ok to round $17mm to ~$20mm or maybe even $25mm (i.e. you are trying to give an idea of magnitude without revealing too much about a private transaction). But $17mm to $50mm is clearly disingenuous. It's not OK to lie for prestige, but it's ok to use ballpark figures within reason. This is not something where you want to push the envelope though, so just play it safe.
Using common sense,
Deal >$1bn, round to $100mm Deal $1bn and >$100mm, round to $10mm Deal $100mm, round to $mm
To be honest, it's been years since I was on the sell-side, but a deal can pro forma out to a certain price and upon closing the pricing moves well past your margin of rounding error.
No one has cared in my experience, especially not when listing it on the resume, where you should be attempting to obfuscate the specific transaction to an extent anyway.
If you think deal size is going to get you in the door, you are wrong.
No one is going to say, "Wow, Candidate A worked on a 400m LBO versus Candidate B, a paltry 150m LBO".
It's going to come down to how you can talk about it. I'm not in the banking world, but if I were interviewing a kid who was from it, I'd be more impressed that he managed an LBO of his little brother's lemonade stand compared to some of the "Deal" experience that interns talk about.
.02 cents
That's really great to hear.
I've been working hard to take on as much responsibility as I can on both pitching and execution; my role has gone from being a monkey who puts together pretty charts to leading the analytical processes and participating in strategy/brainstorming sessions with the Partners.
Now I can stop worrying about deal-size and just focus on performing.
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